Kathy Gherardi |
![]() A qualified and experienced counsellor/ psychotherapist in private practice; a registered member of the British Association for Counselling & Psychotherapy (BACP), with an MA in Psychotherapy from Middlesex University.
Kathy is in private practice as an integrative counsellor/psychotherapist in St Albans, Hertfordshire. Her clients have presented with anxiety, depression, PTSD, issues with sexuality and sexual orientation, psychosis and suicidality. For the past three years, on Wednesdays, she has volunteered as a counsellor for CRI Spectrum Drug and Alcohol Recovery and Rehabilitation Service in Hatfield. She has valid DBS certificate. She has had a personal secular mindfulness practice for the past 28 years. She began developing and teaching public mindfulness courses locally at a Further Education College in September 2014. Via word of mouth recommendation, she began to develop and deliver mindfulness courses and programmes for local businesses and charities, under the auspices of the FE College. Recently she has become a sole trader in order to more effectively deliver her bespoke mindfulness courses and programmes to the public, to businesses and to charities. She incorporates the mindfulness approach in her integrative practice as a counsellor/psychotherapist. She plans to offer Mindfulness Coaching for Career and Life issues in the near future. She is a registered counsellor/psychotherapist: Certificate #102037 She was awarded an MA in Psychotherapy from Middlesex University on 24 February 2012. She is completing a Post Qualifying Certificate in Buddhist Psychotherapy at The Tariki Trust, Narborough, Leicester, UK. She began this training in September 2014. Her approach to secular mindfulness is grounded in the Buddhist tradition. When she has completed the required essay, having done all of the academic courses and clinical training required, she will use this certificate and my MA to achieve accreditation with the BACP (British Association for Counselling and Psychotheraphy). As Mentoring Manager, from January 2007 to October 2008, she developed and implemented a Mentoring Programme for Year 9, 10 and 11 students at a secondary school in south Hertfordshire. She interviewed and selected the staff members who became Academic Mentors.
The integrative psychotherapy course (psychodynamic/Jungian) that Kathy completed was administered and delivered by The Society for Psychology & Healing, the training arm of The Marian Association. The course was validated by Middlesex University. The full, clinical training of lectures, essays and case study submissions, experiential training and group supervision ran from February 2003 to June 2005, part-time. Her training placement was at a day hospice in north London, from 2003 to 2005, where she counselled people who were recovering from cancer. From 1997 to 2002 Kathy was a dedicated supply teacher at her son’s primary school and did supply teaching at other primary schools in north London. She has taught across the subject range and the age range. Kathy taught general science and Biology from 1990 to 1996 at Holloway Boys School which, at the time, was a tough inner city secondary school in Islington, north London. She taught in the UK whilst using her Teaching Certificate from the State of Ohio, USA. (She had moved from high tech industry to teaching). From late autumn 1978 to spring 1988 Kathy worked in the semiconductor industry as an R & D Process Engineer (NCR Microelectronics and INMOS), a QA Manager (INMOS), a Recruitment Consultant (Kramer Westfield) and a European Semiconductor Market Analyst (Dataquest/Gartner).
Kathy was awarded a BA in Biology from Wittenberg University in 1975. She was also awarded a Teaching Certificate (equivalent to a PGCE) from the State of Ohio, USA – specialist area: teaching Biology and General Science at High School level. She was a Rotary Exchange Student and lived in Brazil for a year, from July 1970 to June 1971. She can ‘get by’ in Spanish and South American Portuguese to this day. She graduated from Dover High School in 1971. She is a dual citizen – British/American. |